Summary
Curious to learn more about Little Dorrit's life, Arthur follows her one night and sees her go into the Marshalsea. Lingering outside, he questions an elderly man who turns out to be Frederick Dorrit, the brother of Little Dorrit's father. Frederick leads Arthur into the prison, cautioning him not to tell William Dorrit that his daughter works for pay. Although Amy is very embarrassed to have Arthur see her home life, her father receives him graciously, taking pride in his role as Father of the Marshalsea. They are joined by Amy's two siblings. Before he leaves, Arthur and Amy speak alone, and he assures her that he does not think less of her now that he knows about her home life. He also asks how she came to work for his mother, and Amy explains that when she decided to look for work, she asked a friend to post advertisements on her behalf. Mrs. Clennam hired her based on one of these advertisements. Arthur secretly worries that his parents might somehow be connected to the circumstances that led to the Dorritt brothers being financially ruined.
As he tries to make his way out of the prison, Arthur realizes that he has stayed too late, and is now trapped inside. Amy's brother Tip offers to set him up with lodgings within the prison complex and Arthur spends the night, noting the uncomfortable conditions of the prison. He leaves the next morning but arranges to meet with Little Dorrit at the school where her uncle works and lodges. The two walk together, and Arthur questions her further about whether she knows of any connection to the Clennam family other than her current work. He asks to whom Mr. Dorrit owes the most money, and Amy mentions Mr. Tite Barnacle, but also cautions Arthur that it is unlikely her father can be released from prison. As they walk, they run into Maggy, a young woman who is mentally handicapped and still believes herself to be a ten-year-old child. Amy often cares for Maggy.
A short time later, Arthur seeks out Mr. Tite Barnacle, who works as a government bureaucrat in the Circumlocution Office. However, Arthur is not able to find out any information about Mr. Dorrit's case, and becomes frustrated by the inefficiency and confusion that reigns at the Circumlocution Office. He is surprised to run into Mr. Meagles, who is trying to help an inventor named Daniel Doyce whose case is being handled inefficiently by the office. It turns out that Meagles and Doyce are going to the same neighborhood that Arthur was planning to visit, so the three men travel together to a working-class neighborhood called Bleeding Heart Yard.
Arthur has come seeking Plornish, the man Amy identified as the friend who posted advertisements for her when she was seeking employment. Plornish and his wife explain that after Amy indicated her desire to find work, they took this information to the landlord of the yard, Mr. Casby, and she was hired by Mrs. Clennam a short time later. Arthur also arranges with Plornish to pay off the debts of Tip, Amy's brother. He is intrigued by the mention of Casby, who is the father of the young woman he had once been in love with. A few days later, he calls at the Casby house where he meets Mr. Casby, his daughter Flora, the aunt of Flora's deceased husband, and Pancks, the man employed to collect rents from Bleeding Heart Yard. Arthur is dismayed to find that after more than twenty years, Flora remains frivolous and silly, and he is no longer attracted to her.
As he walks home from the Casby house, Arthur encounters an Italian man who has been struck by a carriage and injured. Since the man does not speak English, Arthur kindly helps him, and leaves his contact information at the hospital. Shortly prior to this, near the French town of Chalons, a mysterious man takes lodgings at an inn where the landlady tells him about a criminal named Rigaud having recently been acquitted in Marseilles due to a lack of solid evidence that he killed his wife. When in his room, the man is surprised to discover that the fellow guest already sleeping there is Jean Baptist Cavalletto. When Cavalletto immediately recognizes the man as Rigaud himself, Rigaud quickly persuades him to hide his identity and call him Lagnier. As soon as it starts to get light, Cavalletto sneaks out of the house and flees so that he does not end up being forced into working for Rigaud/Lagnier. Readers can assume that the Italian man Arthur encounters in London is Cavalletto himself.
Analysis
Although he primarily sees Amy as a child towards whom he feels protective, Arthur's curiosity is undeniably piqued by Little Dorrit. Given expectations around class at this time, it would be unusual for him to spend time getting to know her, especially once he discovers her connection to the prison. However, the status of the Dorrit family is undeniably complex because people imprisoned for debt often came from moderate to high social standings, and would likely be better educated and more sophisticated than many prisoners convicted of other crimes. The snobbery of the Dorrit family is clearly ludicrous and pathetic, but it also contains a kernel of truth. Moreover, it plays with the idea that in any circumstances, there is a strong need for social hierarchy and it will emerge when some individuals assert themselves to be better than others. Although she is often treated like she is naïve or even stupid by her family members, Little Dorrit is the only one with any self-awareness. Arthur also recognizes that she cannot be held responsible for the actions of her family; he might be especially aware of this distinction because of his own desire to distance himself from whatever his mother might be up to.
Arthur's accidental stay in the prison foreshadows events to come, but it also gives him an awareness of how uncomfortable Little Dorrit's life is. This is important because she is too humble and unassuming to complain. Arthur's own unhappy childhood might also give him special compassion towards a young woman who is often lonely and unsupported. Although most readers will detect the early hints of a romantic plotline between these two characters, Arthur's age (40) makes it more plausible that at this point he truly only sees Amy as someone he wants to help. Amy's own nurturing and maternal instincts are highlighted with the introduction of the character of Maggy. Not unlike Amy herself, Maggy blurs the line between child and adult but in the opposite way. While her developmental delay makes her require a lot of help, it also leaves her innocent, kind, and open-hearted. Unlike the many pretentious characters in the novel, Maggy is always totally honest and never pretends to be anything she is not.
The Circumlocution Office is one of the most notable examples of Dickens's critical satire. He was hyper-aware that government and businesses did not always function efficiently, or in the true best interests of the general population. Circumlocution refers to being very verbose or wordy, especially in order to create confusion or delay, and this is essentially what the office does. Doyce, the inventor, is understandably frustrated because he has used his intellect and ingenuity to come up with something that could help people, but bureaucracy keeps stalling. Arthur encounters a similar problem that obstructs his attempt to possibly help the Dorrit family. His experience with the Office and the Barnacle family highlights another dimension of what bad business practices can look like: in contrast to the possible shady secrets hidden by Clennam and Co., the Circumlocution Office openly displays its inefficiency and complete lack of interest in actually achieving anything. Class plays a powerful dynamic in this, since at the time it was considered a mark of high status to do very little and be fashionably idle. This same line of thought explains why Mr. Dorrit is in denial that his children would need to work.
Plotlines start to interweave as Arthur's investigations into the Dorrit family lead him to his former love, Flora. Although Arthur has been remembering her fondly, and the story of their separation seems quite tragic, he is quickly given a reality check by how superficial and silly she is. While Flora means well, she forces Arthur to confront the fact that he is no longer a young man. He is still, however, compassionate and willing to be helpful, which he shows by quickly coming to the aid of the Italian stranger even though he doesn't know the man.
